Ford Zephyr Six
by Richard Dredge (13 July 2007)
If you're a parent, you'll know that despite all those strange leaks, smells and noises your offspring produces, you can't help but love them. It's the same with this 1953 Ford Zephyr Six rally car; all the sounds and odours it emits just give it more personality, and the more you drive it, the warmer you feel towards it. When it comes to that great euphemism "character", this is exactly the sort of car for which it was dreamt up.
Back in 1953, Maurice Gatsonides (he of Gatso speed camera fame) took this very car to victory in the Monte Carlo Rally. Well, sort of, because in 1956 it was involved in a massive smash that led to it being written off then reshelled. So this car is effectively a replica of the original rally version, converted to right-hand drive in the process but retaining all the, er, "charm" in the process.
The Zephyr is part of Ford's huge Heritage Collection, retained to help the company promote more than a century of car building. Sitting alongside in its warehouse, you'll find all sorts of Blue Oval treats such as a Mk1 Lotus Cortina, four-wheel drive Capri, V8 Pilot and various other rarities, including numerous Granadas, Fiestas and Cortinas.
Ford recently lent the Zephyr to me and co-driver Steve Beamond so we could explore the delights of the Laon Historic classic car festival in France - it was only fitting that we should drive a car which was once victorious across
La Manche. We collected the car from its Dagenham base in the run up to the weekend, and while escaping this corner of London is always a good idea, it's probably best to do it in a Zephyrless manner, at least on a Friday afternoon.
The three-speed manual column gearchange is surprisingly slick. What's more disconcerting is how quickly you get through the gears; it's easy to get into overdrive top while negotiating a roundabout, at little more than walking pace.
The unbelievably heavy steering is no better; there seems to be less than a turn between locks, but as the front wheels appear to turn by about five degrees either way, that's not particularly surprising. And then there's the play in the system; I've been in hot air balloons with more precise steering.
Easing onto the A13 then M25, we found ourselves dicing with commuters in their ABS/ESP/EBFD-equipped repmobiles. The Ford certainly gets noticed. There are plenty of appreciative nods and thumbs up, but that doesn't stop any of the buggers from braking sharply then cutting in front of us way after the 100-yard markers have become a distant memory. If only they knew the Zephyr relied on non-assisted drum brakes all round.
We survived the M25 adventure and got to the ferry intact and exhausted. Steve was as unsure as me about what we'd got ourselves into. However, once we were off the ferry and cruising in convoy through the French countryside in the searing heat, suddenly it all made sense.
With its 2.2-litre six-cylinder engine up front, the Zephyr has plenty of torque; this particular example has three carburettors and Ford thinks there's a modified cylinder head. Even with this hotting up there's not much power on tap, but there's a decent spread of torque which more than makes up for it. Bizarrely, the car is much happier at 70mph than at 60; drive too slowly and there's a lot of vibration through the whole cabin.
The problem is, there's so little in reserve at 70mph that if you get into the outside lane to get past slower traffic, you can end up stuck there if the car you're trying to get past suddenly speeds up by 5mph. Despite the lack of performance, the Zephyr is thirsty; we manage just 17mpg across nearly 1000 miles. I once borrowed a 500bhp V12 Mercedes CL 600 that was 50% more economical.
If the dynamics are distinctly suspect, they're nothing compared with the interior. "Ergonomics" was clearly a dirty word at Ford in the 1950s. I'm not sure this car was designed to be driven by humans at all. Sink into the bench seat (which offers all the support of a water bed) and the steering wheel is about six inches too high and at completely the wrong angle. Oddly, the gauges are in the top of the dash rather than the front, so there's no hope of reading them unless you're eight feet tall.
The switchgear is scattered all over the place, with toggle switches on the steering column, dash and console, such as it is. The indicators are in the centre of the steering wheel while the ignition is on one side of the instrument cowling and the starter button is on the other.
The dip switch for the headlights is on the floor, obscured by the clutch pedal and heater control cable. I discovered later that it was easier to just bend down into the footwell and operate the button by hand.
With few Fords to be found during the Laon weekend, the Zephyr went down a storm with the locals as well as the travelling Brits. Steve and I also warmed to it; the oodles of torque allow it to cruise comfortably, even if it does top out too quickly. The brakes aren't much worse than those on my 1969 Triumph Vitesse, and while ergonomics are definitely a disaster, you just adapt as best you can, and hope you don't crash before you've got used to it all.
